Download Political Language, Democracy, and the Language Arts Class

Gregory Shafer
Political Language,
Democracy, and the
Language Arts Class
W
A passive understanding of linguistic meaning is no understanding at all.
—Mikhail Bakhtin, The Dialogic Imagination
e live in a world saturated with divisive political language—a world
of metaphors and adjectives that
conjure up archetypal images of
good and evil, of impending war and celestial conquest. Embedded into our national discourse are
centuries of hyperbolic appeals to save our civilization before it is overrun with heathens that lurk
ominously at our national door. Political language
tells its readers that it is their duty—both moral
and patriotic—to drop their family obligations and
march off to foreign countries to fight and die. It
tells them that they must cease being “sunshine
patriots” and respond to the “imminent threat”
that looms ominously over the horizon. Indeed, as
George Lakoff has suggested in many of his writings, words can construct a reality or “frame” that
justifies a carnage that might not otherwise be embraced by Americans. “Metaphors are more than
language; they can govern thought and behavior,”
wrote Lakoff in a New York Times editorial (“Staying”). Or, as he argued in 2003, in the waning days
before the invasion of Iraq, “metaphors can kill”
(“Metaphor”).
Added to this dilemma is the lack of substantive discourse that our politicians provide for our
scrutiny. Instead of speaking in genuine terms about
an issue, they resort to sound bites and code words to
distort reality and avoid answering a question. We
have George W. Bush’s “axis of evil” and Obama’s
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This article stresses the
importance of understanding
and analyzing political
language. The author claims
that the mastery of such
skills is what allows students
to be participatory members
of a democratic society.
“Fast and Furious.” In both cases, words create general images, precluding a more precise and logical
analysis of government actions and the reality behind its behavior. And if our opposition is evil—as
our language always tells us—our government must
be good, blameless, sacrosanct. Capitalism is good.
Socialism is bad. Communism, despite our collective ignorance as to what it means, is universally nefarious. Words, when used with metaphors and in
a repetitive context, can create a reality that serves
politicians, while undermining genuine progress.
It is the false consciousness, the act of artifice mentioned by Gramsci (in Storey 64), that makes political language the quintessential art of deception,
demanding that students study its essence. Often,
it begins with diction, phrases, buzzwords, visceral
depictions, and fear. And when politicians can successfully design simplistic dichotomies for their
constituents to consume, they have used language as
artifice rather than communication. It is emblematic
of George Orwell’s caveat when he discussed the “reduced sense of consciousness” that “if not indispensable is at any rate favorable to political conformity”
(564). Geoffrey Nunberg puts it slightly differently
when he adds that “language is a kind of informal
plebiscite: when we adopt a new word or alter the
usage of an old one, we’re casting a voice vote for a
particular point of view” (3).
Last semester, my first-year composition class
explored the world of political language from a
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Gregory Shafer
linguistic and political perspective. We aspired to
learn about the words, symbols, and phrases used to
persuade us, while becoming more adept at understanding the way language becomes propaganda.
This endeavor is relevant to both college and high
school students in its emphasis on processing a
language that leads to recruitment in deadly, protracted wars—wars that often involve people in
students’ lives. At no time in our existence has war
and violence become more romanticized, so it is
incumbent upon us as teachers to provide students
with the knowledge and savvy to combat this deceptive and seductive language. Our students must
understand that wars are not always “good” or necessary and that their nation has filled their history
books with a discourse often designed to deceive
them into both accepting and even volunteering to
fight. As Eric Alterman has argued in discussing
the most recent conflicts with Iraq and Afghanistan, “the case Bush made to convince the nation
to embark on its first ever ‘preventative’ war was
riddled with deception from start to finish” (297).
And yet, our nation dove into the conflicts, singing patriotic songs and deriding those who opposed
them. Clearly, it is essential that students understand that language is ideological, that it is socially
constructed and imbued with the aspirations of disparate groups of people. Perhaps Orwell said it best
when he argued that “all issues are political issues.
Politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, and folly,
hatred, and schizophrenia” (565).
From an educational perspective, such a unit
is especially germane to Ira Shor’s idea of problem
posing and the notion that democratic learning
is predicated on active investigation. In his book
Empowering Education: Critical Teaching for Social
Change, Shor suggests that critical thought is only
attainable when students engage in issues and participate in every aspect of the process. Central to
any student empowerment is a careful study of the
language that is part of the political discourse that
swirls around us and seeps into our consciousness.
Each day, we are subjected to words such as terror,
freedom, democracy, and insurgent. In this blitz of provocative diction, it is easy to believe that certain
words are the domain of certain nations or people—
that patriotism is only possible among people who
look like us. Without a careful and critical ability
to scrutinize this language—and the way it is ma-
nipulated to deceive—we are likely to become poisoned by the language we consume.
“I wanted students to be active and thoughtful,” writes Shor in discussing his problem-posing
curriculum. “A participatory class begins with participation. A critical and empowering class begins
by examining its subject matter from the student’s
point of view and by helping students see themselves as knowledgeable people” (37). Essential to
Shor’s premise is the notion of critical inquiry, of
personally active engagement in one’s life and their
place in it as dynamic political beings. Shor does
not want students to learn fealty to a doctrine but
to question it from a rebellious, curious position.
“I wanted them to take, from day one, a critical
attitude toward their knowledge, their writing
habits, and their education” (37). Before this can
happen, however, students
must do a careful study of Central to any student
the language that perme- empowerment is a careful
ates their lives and how im- study of the language
ages are employed to stir that is part of the political
specific emotions. Too often
discourse that swirls
we, as Americans, are told
that we are civilized and around us and seeps into
those who oppose us are our consciousness.
savages. Any opposition to
our endeavors constitutes an attack on an advanced
or “blessed” people. In my class, I wanted students
to deconstruct this often ethnocentric language and
contemplate its motives and veracity. “Participatory
learning,” adds Shor, “also opens the possibility of
transforming the students’ powers of thought” (22).
Additionally, a critical examination of political language is imperative if students are going to
become active players in their own formation as humans. It was Bakhtin who suggested that a people’s
relationship with culture helped create their global
paradigm or what Bakhtin called “ideological becoming” (384). Especially important are the various discourses that an individual is subjected to and
the negotiated power struggles that are an endemic
part of a person’s formation. For Bakhtin, it is essential that students be immersed in competing
discourses and be allowed to scrutinize them in a
nurturing context, one that permits a critical dissection of “authoritative discourses” (341). When
students are asked to examine the political speech in
their world and write about the linguistic strategies
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being employed, they are encouraged to be critical
thinkers and approach language as thoroughly ideological—a must if they are to be reflective citizens
in a flourishing democracy.
Again, I consider such a unit to be particularly important because of the relative naiveté of
many students—both high school and college—
and the prodigious amount of politically charged
speeches that pervade their world. Most of my students enter class with a rather complacent or disaffected attitude toward politics. While many are
quick to echo the political slogans they hear on TV,
few are able to explain the essence of those messages
or interrogate their veracity, validity, or irony. Even
fewer are able to appreciate the way metaphors and
other elements of language work to create images in
their mind. “Metaphors,” wrote Lakoff, “are more
than language; they govern thought and behavior”
(“Staying”). Lakoff goes on to recall a University
of Toronto study that “demonstrated the power of
metaphors that connect morality and purity.” Lakoff tells us that “people who washed their hands
after an unethical act were less troubled by their
thoughts than those who didn’t.” Clearly, symbols
and their meaning to our culture affect our perception of people and language.
The Class Begins
And so, with a political election looming in front of
my students—and with political ads saturating the
prime-time airwaves—I made our research project
about political language and the question of propaganda in American discourse. I began the unit by
having students read Orwell’s “Politics and the En­
glish Language” and devoted an entire week to the
notion that political discourse is unique in its propensity to use words and symbols to move listeners
in certain directions. In many cases, I suggested,
political discourse uses time-honored symbols to
galvanize a population to do or believe something.
“Language can be used,” I told them, “to create a
reality that might be very different from what is actually being experienced.” Their goal in this paper
was to consider the writings of Orwell and others
and explore the ubiquitous use of language to persuade them to believe something about their society. I wanted them to interpret the “spin” or the
emotional aspect of the language aimed at them
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and others. I wanted them to appreciate the use of
words and symbols to evoke a certain response.
Orwell refers to political language as consisting “largely of euphemism, question-begging,
and sheer cloudy vagueness. Such phraseology is
needed if one wants to name things without calling
up mental pictures of them” (564). Because, in the
end, “political language—and with variation this
is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to
Anarchists—is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind” (568).
As we read Orwell’s scathing attack on the deceptive language of politics, we considered the actions of politicians in the past. Orwell suggests that
“the decadence of our language is curable” but argues
that it is imperative for audiences to take action and
to embrace a rebellious, independent perspective that
challenges the status quo. “Orthodoxy, of whatever
colour, seems to demand a lifeless, imitative style”
(564), writes Orwell in considering the language of
various parties and bureaucrats. It is essential, Orwell tells us, to be aware of language and demand a
clearer, more precise communication. He is urging
his readers to actively question the status quo.
As students considered Orwell’s caveat to
make political language better before it makes
our thoughts “foolish,” they examined some of
the speeches used by venerable people from our
past and ruminated on the way language was orchestrated to create a specific effect. After reading
Orwell’s indictment of “Politics and the En­glish
Language,” we read short excerpts from famous
speeches and considered the agenda of the speaker
or writer and how language was employed to make
that agenda a certainty—even if it was crafted to
sound like something quite different from what
was being said.
In reading Thomas Jefferson’s inaugural address (qtd. in Kennedy), we reflected on the deferential style, the use of passive voice, and the many
images of unity that seem to belie the bitter election contest that had transpired between Jefferson
and his opponent John Adams. Jake, a student in
my class, noted the passive voice in the first lines of
the address and the constant request for assistance
from the people around him. “You would think
that this guy didn’t run for political office but was
just chosen because of his humility,” said Jake with
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to “duty” that is mentioned often in the piece. “He
makes people believe that this is something he is
doing for them—that he is just one of many people
who have a higher good to enforce.”
In other political addresses and speeches,
we found similar uses of language. When looking
with a critical eye, and with a knowledge of how
words create a certain image in the situation and
speaker, we began to consider speech from a more
political and critical perspective. “It’s easy,” said
another student named Cindy, “to get ensnared
in the words and lofty ideas. Political language is
meant to sweep you away.” In supporting her position, she referred to Jefferson’s diction in using
words such as encouragement, guidance, and support
in appealing to the audience for assistance. “He
makes others feel powerful when in fact he is assuming the ultimate power,” she said with a grin.
“He is saying one thing but meaning something
quite different.”
Thomas Jefferson’s First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1801
a grin. “And yet, we know that he used journalists
to spread lies about Adams before the election.”
In particular, Jake was referring to Jefferson’s
opening words, where he says: “Called upon to undertake the duties of the first executive office of our
country, I avail myself of the presence of that portion of my fellow citizens which is here assembled
to express my grateful thanks for the favour with
which they have been pleased to look toward me,
to declare a sincere consciousness that the task is
above my talents, and that I approach it with those
anxious and awful presentiments which the greatness of the charge and the weakness of my powers so
justly inspire” (qtd. in Kennedy 41).
“You’d think he really didn’t want to do it
but only honor and the love of his honorable friends
were motivating him,” added Tamika. “In truth,
he fought and used pretty shadowy tactics to win
this job.” Other students noted the parallel structure that is so often a part of political language.
“He uses the word ‘greatness’ and parallels it with
‘weakness’ to praise the office he is assuming,” revealed another student. “He does this to be deferential and win over the opposition.”
As a class, we examined the self-effacing tone,
the constant flattery of the audience, and the call
Contemporary Critics
A second reading that helped to animate my students was Robert W. McChesney’s criticism of
media and its ties to politics. McChesney, who has
written prolifically on media and its integral connection to democracy, contends that Americans do
not live in a democracy because of the monopoly
control of media outlets by transnational corporations. For McChesney, the shrinking number of
independent sources for information is a reason to
question democracy since alternative points of view
are gradually being stymied by transnational corporations that promulgate an agenda that is congruent with their political agenda. According to
McChesney, “the corporate media cement a system whereby the wealthy and powerful few make
the most important decisions with virtually no informed public participation” (281).
McChesney goes on to argue that “critical
political issues are barely covered by the corporate
media, or else are warped to fit the confines of elite
debate, stripping citizens of the tools they need to
be informed, active participants in a democracy”
(281). In the end, he concludes, “the prospects for
making the United States a more egalitarian, self
governing and humane society seems dim to the
point of non-existence” (281).
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Political Language, Democracy, and the Language Arts Class
I typically present students with a spectrum
of critical voices on language and politics, helping
them to see the concern many leading writers have
about communication and the health of our democracy. In doing this, I have found Howard Zinn’s
Artists in Times of War to be an indispensable work
on both the hegemony that exists in our culture
and the need for burgeoning writers and activists
to take action. “But the artist can and should do
more,” writes Zinn early in his work. “In addition
to creating works of art, the artist is also a citizen
and a human being” (8). Zinn goes on to lament the
failure of many of us to become active in political
discourse because of the language that is crafted, a
language that is carefully tailored to make us silent and passively loyal. “It’s exactly at such times
when we need dissenting voices. The irony,” writes
Zinn, “is that it’s exactly in times of war—when
you’re dealing with life-and-death matters—that
you’re not supposed to speak. So you have freedom
of speech for trivial matters but not for life-anddeath matters” (54–55).
After reading Zinn, McChesney, and Orwell,
many of my students are more aware of the impact
of propaganda and the tenuous place of free speech
and democracy. As one student said in a later discussion, “we don’t have democracy because it is
written in the Bill of Rights but because we fight
for it and demand it through political action.”
Projects
Students are free to write about virtually any aspect of political discourse. The goal of the unit is
to invite them to explore this unique kind of language and approach it from a more analytical, more
inquisitive position. Most students in introductory writing classes believe that political language
is plausible because it is filtered through rigorous
questioning by media forces. They think that politicians are kept honest by a free and independent
press. However, after reading McChesney and about
the consolidation of power—and how media forces
often act to silence the voices of people—they are
more able to conduct their research from a realistic
position.
One of the most popular topics was the war on
terror and the language used to create a context for
its acceptance. In the fall of 2012, when this proj-
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ect was completed, the national climate had turned
sharply against former President Bush’s wars. Unlike years earlier, when many argued vociferously
for a united front against the “Axis of Evil,” many
participants now wondered why they had been seduced by the lies and deceptions and how it could
be avoided in the future. Added to this conundrum
was the active involvement of many of my students’
friends, who were serving in the military and risking their lives for a struggle they no longer understood. “How did we get here?” asked one of my
students as we began our research. “It seemed so
real a few years ago.”
Many students sought to uncover the linguistic machinations of their political leaders, to unravel the words and symbols that exhorted them to
do something that they now were sure was a deadly
mistake. One of the most interesting papers came
from Carl, who wrote about the repetition of certain
words and the power of instilling a certain emotion
in the national psyche. For his paper, Carl looked
at the use of language to create a symbolic evil in
an entire population of people and the impact of
this campaign. Carl, an African American, began
by looking at the way language had been used to
demean and ostracize the black person in America.
He referred to an essay by Ossie Davis where the
writer and actor discusses the way language is employed to sully the image of an entire race of African Americans.
“The word blackness has 120 synonyms, 60 of
which are distinctly unfavorable, and none of them
even mildly positive” (52), argues Davis. He then
goes on to list the many pejorative synonyms and
argues that it is virtually impossible for a culture
to have a positive perception of black people when
they are deluged with negative words and the perceptions that go with them. Davis concludes his
essay by suggesting that “any teacher good or bad,
white or black, Jew or gentile, who uses the En­glish
language as a medium of communication is forced
willy-nilly, to teach the Negro child 60 ways to despise himself and the white child 60 ways to aid
and abet him in the crime” (52).
From this, Carl looked at the manner in
which language was used to lump the Iraqi nation
with their leader Saddam Hussein and the way language was employed to make a nation culpable for
the crimes of their leader. To do this, Carl examined
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Gregory Shafer
many of the speeches and declarations
Dustin authored a powerful
made by the Bush administration in
paper on the use of language to goad
the weeks and months leading to the
people into fighting, exhorting them
invasion of Iraq. Over and over, he
to do their moral duty before it is too
found that speeches and statements
late. Key to the paper was Dustin’s
were crafted to make Iraq the evil
careful look at speeches from the
other rather than pointing to the perpast and the ways guilt and duty are
son who was actually responsible for
mixed with references to God to crethe crimes. In January, three months
ate a recipe for war. Dustin looked at
before the invasion, Vice President
Thomas Paine’s Common Sense arguDick Cheney was one of a chorus of
ment and his employment of insults
voices who told Americans that their
to foster a sense of guilt in the reader.
lives were threatened by Iraq.
When Paine calls the reader a “sunOn January 30, 2003, Cheney
shine patriot” or “summer soldier”
told Americans that “Iraq threatens
he is implying that certain citizens
the United States of America.” On
are only willing to fight when the
Thomas Paine’s Common Sense,
the same day, he suggested that “Iraq 1776
task is easy. He suggests that this is a
poses terrible threats to the civilized
“test of manhood and even morality.”
world,” and the next day, Cheney argued that “Iraq
Dustin compared Paine’s speech to George
is a serious threat to our country, our friends, and
Bush’s description of the enemy. In it, Bush refers
our allies” (for more information see http://www
to the opposition as the “enemy” seven times and
.americanprogress.org). The cumulative effect of
asks Americans to defeat
Dustin authored a powerful
this, argued Carl, is to hold the Iraqi people responthis enemy that “hides in
sible for the sins of their leader and to stigmatize an
the shadows” and “preys paper on the use of
entire people to a category of savage or, as Cheney
on innocent and unsuspect- language to goad people
implied, “uncivilized.” Such broad generalizations
ing people, then runs for into fighting, exhorting
make it easier to hate an entire race of people, an
cover” (qtd. in Snow 58). them to do their moral duty
entire nation, wrote Carl. “It makes their deaths
In short, argued Dustin, before it is too late.
less significant.”
the language blends images
Other papers focused on the term Axis of Evil
of darkness with the moral need to dispose of this
and the implications of such language for our nadarkness monster before it becomes too powerful.
tional perceptions. As many students declared, it is
“The language of both speeches,” argued Dustin,
easier to wage war on “evil” than to kill and destroy
“remind us of some Biblical struggle.”
individuals who are probably a lot like us. Ilham, a
Examining political language from different
student from Syria, argued that words like evil are
eras can help students to appreciate the common
misleading in their broad brushing of an entire peothreads that bind campaigns from one age to anple. “When you say entire nations are evil, you wash
other. Samantha delved into the political speeches
your hands of any crime when you bomb and inflict
of Theodore Roosevelt and common linguistic
pain on the families and children of those nations,”
tactics shared with politicians who use terror as a
she said. The word choice makes this into a holy
weapon of fear. In his speech of 1896, Roosevelt
war—God against Satan—and negates the considercampaigned for future President William McKination of people who might not be different from us.
ley, using many of the same linguistic strategies
Her essay focused on the extreme, monolithic
used by Dick Cheney in persuading Americans
language used by US politicians and pundits in the
to reelect George W. Bush. In describing McKinwake of the war. “These are words meant to create
ley’s opponent, William Jennings Bryan, Roosevelt
dichotomies in our minds,” she said with passion.
compared him to Robespierre and other “leaders
“When he says you are either with us or against us,
of the Terror of France,” declaring that Bryan and
he is using language to create no alternative. You
his companions were like “the leaders of terror in
are either good or bad, moral or evil.”
mental and moral attitude” (116). Later, Roosevelt
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resorted to the metaphor to argue that Bryan and
his team were rallying around a “dark and mean
hostility and envy felt for all men of ability by those
unworthy men who care more to see their brethren
fail than themselves to win success by earning and
deserving it” (116). Finally, Roosevelt argued that
Bryan was opposed to every form of “enterprise and
thrift” that constitutes “civilization” (116).
In her paper, Samantha compared Roosevelt’s
allusions to civilization, darkness, and terror—all
provocative words—to the speeches of Dick Cheney
and George W. Bush, who harangued Americans
with the notion of terror and imminent danger.
Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden were symbols of darkness and threats to civilization. Americans were forever deluged with various alerts as to
the degree of danger they were under. In the same
way that Roosevelt made Bryan the enemy to civilization, Bush and Cheney made any opposition to
war an attack on freedom and safety. In her paper,
Samantha referred to Mark Crispin Miller, who
argues that “one of the oldest tricks in the book
used against democracy or republicanism has been
to terrify people, has been to create a crisis and
to provoke a war. At that moment, sad to say,”
adds Miller, “people cease to become capable of
reason” (206).
How important is a research unit on language
and propaganda? Perhaps the best way to measure
its significance is to consider our national endeavors throughout history to silence those who spoke
truth to power. In the incipient years of our nation,
John Adams, the venerable second president, was
responsible for the Alien and Sedition Act, making
it a crime to speak against the nation or its leaders. Adams’s goal was to muffle the journalists and
citizens who questioned his handling of the war between England and France and America’s position
in it. One century later, Woodrow Wilson was responsible for dozens of people being imprisoned for
speaking against World War I when he supported
the Espionage Act, leading to the deportation of
such icons as Emma Goldman and the incarceration
of Eugene Debs.
And today, five decades after the McCarthy
era, one feels the same chill in looking at the treatment of the Dixie Chicks, the intrepid trio who
dared to speak against their president on the eve of
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the war. How can one forget the willingness of Dan
Rather and other journalists to line up and support
the invasion, the firing of comedian Bill Maher,
and the various songs recorded simply to silence
dissent?
In her book Information War: American Propaganda, Free Speech, and Opinion Control since 9/11,
Nancy Snow argues that Americans have long been
“easily manipulated” (33) by slick and deceptive
propaganda. The problem, argues Snow, is that
Americans are “ignorant of the way political language is orchestrated. We don’t have the necessary
tools to counter the propaganda” (33), she laments.
What seems clear, many years after the invasion of
Iraq and the exposure of lies and political machinations, is that Americans need to study language and
propaganda. It is essential to our liberation in a real
democracy.
Works Cited
Alterman, Eric. When Presidents Lie: A History of Official
Deception and Its Consequences. New York: Penguin,
2004. Print.
Bakhtin, Mikhail. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays by
M. M. Bahktin. Ed. Michael Holquist. Trans. Caryl
Emerson and Michael Holquist. Austin: U of Texas
P, 1981. Print.
Davis, Ossie. “The En­glish Language Is My Enemy!” Language and Prejudice. Ed. Tamara M. Valentine. New
York: Pearson, 2004. 50–52. Print.
Kennedy, Caroline. A Patriot’s Handbook: Songs, Poems, Stories, and Speeches Celebrating the Land We Love. New
York: Hyperion, 2003. Print.
Lakoff, George. “Metaphor and War, Again.” AlterNet. 17
Mar. 2003. Web. 10 Aug. 2012.
———. “Staying the Course Right over a Cliff.” New York
Times 27 Oct. 2006: editorial page. Print.
McChesney, Robert W. Rich Media, Poor Democracy: Communication Politics in Dubious Times. New York: New
Press, 2003. Print.
Miller, M. Crispin. Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear and the
Selling of American Empire. Ed. Sut Jhally and Jeremy
Earp. New York: Olive Branch, 2004. 202–16.
Print.
Nunberg, Geoffrey. Talking Right: How Conservatives Turned
Liberalism into a Tax-Raising, Latte-Drinking, SushiEating, Volvo-Driving, New York Times-Reading, BodyPiercing, Hollywood-Loving, Left-Wing Freak Show.
New York: PublicAffairs, 2006. Print.
Orwell, George. “Politics and the En­glish Language.” One
Hundred Great Essays. Ed. Robert DiYanni. New
York: Longman, 2003. 555–68. Print.
Roosevelt, Theodore. Theodore Roosevelt: An American Mind:
Selected Writings. New York: Penguin, 1994. Print.
Shor, Ira. Empowering Education: Critical Teaching for Social
Change. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1992. Print.
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Snow, Nancy. Information War: American Propaganda, Free
Speech, and Opinion Control since 9/11. New York:
Seven Stories, 2003. Print.
Storey, John. Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: An Introduction. 4th ed. Athens: U of Georgia P, 2006. Print.
Zinn, Howard. Artists in Times of War. New York: Seven Stories, 2003. Print.
Gregory Shafer teaches En­glish composition at Mott Community College in Flint, Michigan, and is past president of the
Michigan Council of Teachers of En­glish. Email: [email protected].
R E A D W R IT E T H IN K C O N N E CT ION Lisa Storm Fink, RWT
In the ReadWriteThink.org lesson plan “Propaganda Techniques in Literature and Online Political Ads,” students
analyze propaganda techniques used in pieces of literature and political advertisements. They then look for propaganda in other media, such as print ads and commercials. http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/
lesson-plans/propaganda-techniques-literature-online-405.html
Stick-Gluing the American Dream
I tell them to envision the American Dream,
happy or sad,
good or bad,
in a collage.
“How big?” “On poster board?” “Can I do a PowerPoint?” “How many points is it worth?”
“Do you want an explanation?” “Is nudity okay?” “Why are we doing this?” “Can I write it out?”
Next day, in roll two-seater Porsches, Oprah-sized mansions, feather-wake yachts, bikini models,
cartoon cash, Trump’s trophy wife
stick- or spray-glued to everything from
fringed notebook paper to shellacked three-quarter inch plywood.
Each student stands to defend/explain his dream
or nightmare,
most buying
the fantasy, but some cloak their America darkly:
The bearded, homeless vet,
the doomed downtown Detroit,
and the pair of Great Depression eyes
standing before a shack black
as the pupils trapped inside
what must have been
a beautiful iris.
—Richard Holinger
© 2013 by Richard Holinger
Richard Holinger’s fiction, poetry, and essays have appeared in The Southern Review, The Iowa Review, Boulevard, and
elsewhere. He has received three Pushcart Prize nominations. His short fiction collection, Not Everybody’s Nice, won the
2012 Split Oak Press Flash Prose Chapbook Contest. He has taught English at Marmion Academy in Illinois’s Fox Valley for
more than 30 years.
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